WASHINGTON — One of the trickiest tightropes being walked by the 2008 US presidential candidates, all of them descended from immigrants, is how to tackle illegal immigration as they bid for the White House ...

"Democrats are badly divided on the immigration issue. They want to appeal to Latinos (Hispanics seen as favorable to liberal US immigration policy) but don't want to alienate more moderate and conservative factions of the party," Michael Shifter, vice president of the Inter-American Dialogue, told AFP ...

In last week's debate in Las Vegas, Clinton came out against the idea of giving state drivers' licenses, which are used as official identification, to illegal immigrants with a flat "no," after being slammed for waffling on the issue in an earlier debate in Philadelphia.

And although he knew the controversial issue would be back on the table, Obama was also sideswiped by the issue in Las Vegas. After skirting a direct answer, he finally told a CNN moderator he favored illegal immigrants having access to official drivers' licenses.

But on the Republican side, other than John McCain, who represents the Hispanic-heavy border state of Arizona, the candidates all argue for a hard line to be drawn at the US border ...

Tom Tancredo, a Republican hopeful, explicitly ties the two in ads highlighting the "20 million aliens who have come to take our jobs" and "Islamic terrorists [who] now freely roam US soil."

But by slamming illegals, Republicans risk losing support among immigrant-friendly Hispanic voters.

Immigration "is an issue that is a hot potato issue," said Peter Romero, a former top US diplomat for Latin America.

"The campaign at least so far, has evolved around 'run no risks, make no gaffes and make no mistakes'. Using the wrong word, using the wrong terms, can get you in lot of trouble," added Romero, noting that neither Democrats nor Republicans had been clear and forthcoming on the issue to date ...

US Hispanics, the United States' largest and fastest-growing minority with almost 45 million people, could play a critical role in deciding who moves into the White House ...

"The Republicans are losing one of the great swing votes in American politics," said Larry Sabato, political analyst at the University of Virginia.

Nationalist leader Pia Kjaersgaard's anti-Muslim outbursts have earned her many labels — and many votes.

Despite predictions of her populist Danish People's Party's demise, Kjaersgaard remains a powerful force in domestic politics after winning 14 percent of the vote in last week's election.

"The most important thing for the Danish People's Party is to maintain the Danish identity," Kjaersgaard, 60, told The Associated Press in an interview.

"I am convinced that the Islamists want to sneak Sharia (Islamic law) through the back door, that they want to combat Western society and they want Islam to become the main religion," she said.

Her party — Denmark's third biggest — has held the role of kingmaker since 2001, giving the center-right government the backing it needs for a majority in Parliament.

In return, Kjaersgaard has been able to press the government to adopt some of Europe's strictest immigration laws, which she says have been instrumental in stemming the inflow of Muslims with radical views.

There are an estimated 200,000 Muslims among Denmark's 5.4 million residents.

"The individual Muslim has never been a problem for Danish society. But their number has," Kjaersgaard told AP in her office, decorated with Danish flags and paintings depicting Danish landscapes ...

The flow of asylum-seekers has dropped by 84 percent since Denmark tightened its immigration laws in 2001. There is now broad agreement across party lines to maintain the system ...

During last year's uproar over Danish caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, Kjaersgaard and other leading party members took turns blasting Islam as incompatible with Danish traditions including free speech.

Ahead of the Nov. 13 election, one of the party's campaign posters showed an artist's hand drawing a picture of Muhammad, with the text "Freedom of speech is Danish, censorship is not."

"Sometimes I wonder what other people think about me — 'is she a monster?'" Kjaersgaard conceded in a moment of introspection. "I need to brush these things off, otherwise I will go down."

Kjaersgaard, who lives with round-the-clock police protection, quickly added she has no regrets about anything she has said ...

When asked if she thought Islam can contribute to Danish society in any way, she replied: "I don't think so at all."

The White season features a series of films that shine the spotlight on the white working-class in Britain today. It examines why some feel increasingly marginalised, and explores possible reasons behind the rise in popularity of far-right politics in some sections of this community.

As "white trash" and "chav" become commonplace insults, the films explore the complex mix of feelings that lead some people to feel under siege and that their very sense of self is being brought into question.

And, as newly arrived immigrant populations move in, the season examines the conflict between the communities and explores the economic and psychological tensions.White Girl

Anna Maxwell Martin (Bleak House) stars in Abi Morgan's compelling film about an inspirational 11-year-old girl, Leah, and her family's relocation to an entirely Muslim community in Bradford. A provocative and emotional drama, it explores the hope as well as the tension that can arise when two very different cultures collide.

Leaving her home in Leeds and a broken relationship with Stevie, Debbie begins a new life with her three children – but being the only white family in a wholly Asian community was never part of the plan.

For Leah, the feeling of isolation is heightened at school when she discovers that she and her siblings are the only white kids. But Leah views the Muslim culture and faith with innocent fascination, finding a refuge of calm and safety which is in sharp contrast to the pain and sadness at home.

Befriending Yasmin, her young Asian neighbour, and with the gentle guidance of teachers at school, Leah learns that her new world is not as alien as she first feared.

However, nothing prepares Debbie for the shock of seeing her daughter wearing a hijab. With Leah's grandmother, Sonia, up in arms and Stevie back on the scene, the consequences are explosive – for Debbie and Leah alike.

Starring Anna Maxwell Martin as Debbie, with newcomer Holly Kenny as Leah, Daniel Mays as Stevie and Melanie Hill as Leah's grandmother, White Girl is a tender exploration of Islam through the eyes of a child, from the writer of the Bafta and RTS Award-winning Sex Traffic.

Last Orders

Last Orders tells the story of the embattled Wibsey Working Men's Club in the city of Bradford.

Once regarded as the "backbone of the nation", white working-class communities in the UK now often feel themselves the object of ridicule. Considering themselves forgotten by a Labour Government, which many people in these communities think is reluctant to acknowledge their existence, many white working-class people feel as if they have fallen off the edge of the policy table, with the smoking ban the latest example.

The Wibsey Club has been operating at a loss for several years and members' worries for their club mirror larger anxieties. With high unemployment and a perception that recent Asian immigrants receive the lion's share of Government benefits, members feel that their very community is under threat and that racial tensions could erupt at any time.

Bafta- and Emmy-nominated director Henry Singer follows up his critically acclaimed 9/11 film, The Falling Man, by spending several months in one white working-class community whose story reveals much about the breakdown of social cohesion in 21st-century Britain.

All White In Barking

In 2003, film-maker Marc Isaacs made a Greenlight Award-winning film for BBC Two about refugees, economic migrants and the English in Calais. Now, four years on, he explores similar themes in a new context – Barking, East London – in a Storyville special for the White season.

Lifetime Barking residents Susan and Jeff have never said hello to their Nigerian neighbours, insisting that "they are not our people". Dave is so incensed by the influx of non-white faces to Barking that he becomes a BNP activist – yet both his daughters have relationships with the very people he is lashing out against.

Meanwhile, African Betty and Holocaust survivor Monty form an unusual relationship based on laughter and affection, despite disapproving stares.

The film-maker is an unseen, but prominent, presence, questioning prejudices and prying at preconceptions with remarkable results to produce a charming and often funny examination of modern attitudes in an increasingly multicultural Britain.

The Poles Are Coming

Poland wants its Poles back. But, after one of the biggest migrations in recent history, are we really ready to let them go? Tim Samuels, award-winning documentary-maker and the man responsible for forming The Zimmers, takes an entertainingly subversive look at the reality of immigration in Middle England.

Listening to some locals, it would appear that the city of Peterborough is being pushed to breaking point by a massive influx of Eastern Europeans. Some want the Poles, and others, to go home. So does the city of Gdansk – once birthplace of the Solidarity movement that helped defeat Communism, but which now can't find enough workers to fill its shipyards or build its football stadium for Euro 2012.

Now Gdansk's leaders are heading to Peterborough to plead with their countrymen to come back. The programme asks what would happen to our economy if they did leave and whether any will be tempted away. Immersing himself in the lives of Polish immigrants and some discontented local neighbours, Tim gets under the skin of one of Britain's thorniest issues.

Rivers Of Blood

Forty years ago, Enoch Powell, the maverick Conservative MP, gave a speech on immigration in which he predicted a future of racial strife in Britain.

The "rivers of blood" speech – so-called because he quoted the Roman poet Virgil, saying: "I see the Tiber foaming with much blood" – outraged the political establishment, who considered it both racist and inflammatory.

However, the speech struck a chord with the public who wrote to him in their thousands, and London's dockers came out on strike in support.

In this fascinating and intriguing film, Denys Blakeway assesses the impact of the speech – arguably one of the most important in Britain in the last century – and traces its subsequent effect on immigration policy and the rise of multiculturalism in the UK.

The BBC is to risk controversy with a season of programmes about a white working class "under siege" ...

Conservative MP David Davies, who is a member of the home affairs select committee, attacked the BBC for coming late to the issue.

He said: "If they are under siege its partly the result of 20 to 30 years of multiculturalist policies that the BBC has been at the forefront of championing.

"The white working class have been ignored by the establishment for many decades ...

BBC2 controller Roly Keating said he hoped the programmes would provoke debate about race and immigration.

He said: "'This is a very topical issue with debate raging in the media, amongst politicians, community leaders and our audiences. It's the right time for BBC TWO to shine a light on some of the communities involved, give viewers the chance to consider these issues in depth and join in an informed debate.

"Some of the people in the programmes do have controversial opinions on race and the multi-culturalism in the area they live in, but we are not advocating their views and will be careful to ensure that there is balance in the range of opinions and experiences across the season ...

Italy, Denmark, Switzerland . . . all around us we are having to deal with the consequences of immigration ...

Immigration is toxic now in most of the developed world. In Britain, Gordon Brown's Government seems eager to test to destruction its insistence that tolerance is the essential facet of what it means to be British. The incomparable bungling that resulted in illegal immigrants being hired among other things to police border security would surely be parody if it were not prosaic reality ...

In Italy, Romanians are in the cross-hairs, after one of them was charged with beating and sexually assaulting a teacher. Last week the Danish Government won re-election only with the continued support of the anti-immigrant People's Party. Last month the Swiss party that goes by the same name got more votes than any party in that country since 1919, with the help of a campaign that included imagery such as a flock of white sheep kicking a black sheep off a Swiss flag. Anti-immigrant sentiment continues to boil in France and the Netherlands.

... the Governor of New York, was forced to withdraw an ill-conceived proposal to give driving licences to illegal immigrants ... and the issue looks set to become perhaps the biggest issue of the presidential election campaign - especially if, as it is currently, progress in Iraq takes the war off the front pages ...

Our political, intellectual and media elites ponder this turn of events with a disdainful eye. They shake their heads at the irredeemable bigotry of the masses and wring their hands at the primitive ignorance that drives the popular mood.

But our leaders should instead be looking hard at their own role in helping to create this rising backlash against immigration. It comes after 50 years in which, against their own will and better judgment, the masses have been directed to shed anachronistic and dangerous notions of national identity. In Europe especially, the multicultural worldview insisted that we should look with benign neutrality on global cultural diversity, to think of other cultures as no worse than our own, and in many respects quite a bit better. Patriotism equalled racism. National identity was incompatible with global peace.

So what happens when you spend decades suppressing national identity? Do you actually succeed in pouring us all into a great big melting pot? Or do you, in fact, simply nurture a subterranean sense of national selfhood; steadily curdling it over the years so that, when it reasserts itself, it is angry, illiberal and ugly? In Europe we see the consequences everywhere. The current mood, of course, is partly economic — the cheap immigrant stealing our jobs. It partly reflects heightened insecurity, especially the very specific threat posed by Islamists, the vipers in the bosoms of too many Muslim communities. But, as the Italian-Romanian incident shows, it goes much farther, and can take the unprepossessing form of raw and ancient hatreds ...

So now we have one hell of a mess. We - all of us - need immigration. We can't close our doors. In Europe, mountainous demographic challenges mean the only plausible supply of labour is from overseas. But even America cannot afford to be autarkic. It needs strong and steady flows of immigrants to power the world's most dynamic capitalist system ...

Only by insisting that our own national identity and sovereignty is non-negotiable will we be able to continue both to welcome new immigrants and to maintain our chance at prosperity, and even survival, in a competitive and dangerous world.

To acknowledge something as toxic, but then say "we can't close our doors" is the definition of an addiction. Mark Steyn:

Whatever the virtuousness of immigration, a dependence on it is a sign of profound structural weakness, and, when all the self-congratulation about celebrating diversity has died down, that weakness ought to be understood as such.

Given the choice between mass immigration, and repairing our internal structural weakness on our own, I reckon a lot of folk would say "we'll manage and turn it around ourselves thanks". Gerard Baker, thinks that all can be fixed by just asserting our own national identity. Sure.

By welcoming Turkey into Europe, we will prove how two cultures can not only exist together, but thrive together, as partners in the modern world. Accession means a more pluralist, tolerant and inclusive Turkey - and a more pluralist, tolerant and inclusive Europe.' ...

Turkey is a "secular nation" with a "majority Muslim population"? Turkey is, despite more than 80 years of Kemalism, with its systematic campaign to suppress Islam's political and social power, not nearly "secular" enough. Islam is back -- not that it ever went away -- and how. Erbakan, and then Ergodan, and then Abdullah Gul, and all the rest of it. The cunning assault on the legitimacy of the army, the final upholder of Kemalism. The assault from within the universities on secular rectors and professors, and the determination to renew state support for Muslim schools and openness to government hiring of graduates of strictly Muslim schools and colleges. No, Turkey is not what it may once have been -- say, in 1940, or even 1950. Islam keeps coming back.

... Does he know that Constantinople in 1914 was 50% non-Muslim, and that Turkey as a whole was about one-quarter non-Muslim? What happened to all those non-Muslims, Armenians, Greeks, Jews, Levantines of every description? Did he forget, or did he never know?

And now he wants to admit this nation of 70 million Muslims, a nation becoming more dangerously Muslim every day -- proving that those who count on Ataturks can't count on very much, for the power of a potentially resurgent Islam never disappears, but always comes back -- into the European Union, because this will "prove" that Islam and the West can get along. How does he know? Has he carefully studied, since he's had time on his hands, the texts of Islam? Has he carefully studied the 1350-year history of Islam's encounters with, conquest or attempted conquest of, non-Muslim lands and peoples, so that Islam can everywhere dominate, and Muslims rule everywhere? Why does he think it would be different if those 70 million Muslim Turks, reproducing far faster than any of Europe's non-Muslims, added to the tens of millions of Muslims -- Algerians, Moroccans, Egyptians, Tunisians, Somalis, Kurds, Iraqis, Syrians, Lebanese Muslims, and of course "Palestinians" -- already in Europe, were allowed to travel freely throughout Schengenland, that is, all of visa-free Europe? What does he think would be the effect of making it easier for other Middle Eastern people, Arabs and Kurds not Turks, to enter the E.U. as Turks? For who, among those checking the borders, will be able to easily separate out the strange Turks from the just-as-strange Arabs, carrying false Turkish passports? A security nightmare, and a civilizational bet that only someone nearly insane would wish to make.

Jack Straw is nearly insane, for he ignores the texts, and the tenets, and the attitudes, and the 1350 years of history, all of which point in a direction opposite to the one in which he is so determinedly faced. Jack Straw ... knows nothing of Islam, and is, in general, an ignoramus about the relevant history ...

Jack Straw, in his foolishness, is simply a representative of the Western elites that have turned their heads away from the Jihad, focused manically on the "two tiny peoples" business in Israel, and permitted the demographic invasion, and possible conquest from within, of Western Europe ...

This brief overview of certain passages in the Quran is in response to claims by Muslims and others that the Quran does not incite to violence, that Jihad 'always indicates the inner struggle to be a good Muslim; never does it indicate armed or military action' and that primitive Islam was basically a 'tolerant' system of beliefs ...

The primary meaning of Jihad

Jahada, the root of the word Jihad, appears 40 times in the Quran - under a variety of grammatical forms. With the exception of Sura 6, 16, 24 and 35, all the other usages are variations of the 3rd Form of the verb, i.e. Jahida which in the Quran and in subsequent Islamic understanding meant and means 'he fought, warred or waged war against unbelievers and the like'.

Because, in the 1st Form, the verb Jahada may mean simply 'he exerted himself, he strove' one finds that euphemisms abound in almost all editions of the Quran intended for non-Muslims when translating the meaning of the 3rd form.

Apologists claim that Jihad in the Quran primarily refers to 'spiritual asceticism' and not militarism. Readers unfamiliar with Arabic are offered 'strive' or 'struggle' or some other neutral word, as a translation of the verb used in the 3rd Form i.e. Jahida ...

Some Quranic Suras

Against all unbelievers in Islam/Allah

'O you who believe, wage war against those of the unbelievers who are near to you and let them find in you hardness.' [Sura 9]

'Surely the vilest of animals in the sight of Allah are those who disbelieve.' [Sura 8]

'Polytheists ... are the worst of creatures' [Sura 98]

'O you who believe, do not take the unbelievers for friends.' [Sura 4; see also 60]

'Wage war in the cause of Allah' ... and goad on the believers. [Sura 4] ...

Muhammad: 'Lord of the Scimiter'

Muhammad moved to Yathreb aged 53, and a new, tougher and merciless personality almost immediately emerged from his prophetic chrysalis. The relatively placid person who spent 13 years trying to win over his relatives and neighbours to his new religion turned into the unforgiving Warrior determined to subdue his tribe by force and humble those who had mocked him. The prophet's behaviour, allegedly endorsed by God, gave the lie to the Islamic mantra: 'God, the forgiving and all-merciful'...

The Meccan Suras contain no reference to a Holy War. On the other hand the Medina Suras are so full of verses on this subject that this obligation appears to be more heavily stressed than any other ...

The last 10 years of Muhammad's life in Medina saw Islam gradually transformed from a vague social experiment with a religious face into a militant and intimidatory force whose progress depended on booty from raids and revenue from the tax. At Muhammad's command prisoners were killed and political assassinations took place ...

Muhammad personally took part in 27 raids between his arrival in Medina and his death ...

Muhammad's last words before his death were, 'Let not two religions be left in the Arabian Peninsular' ...

Authorship of the Quran

The available evidence points to the Quran being the words of Muhammad; not the words of God ...

In the judgement of a Muslim writer, 'Apart from the thirteen years of the prophet's mission in Mecca, the history of Islam is indisputably a record of violence and power-seizure. As long as the prophet lived, force was used primarily for the purpose of spreading Islam and imposing it'.

... in the Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam: 'Djihad: holy war. The spread of Islam by arms is a religious duty upon Muslims in general. It narrowly escaped being a sixth rukn, or fundamental duty, and is indeed so regarded by the descendants of the Kharkdjis'.

A major incitement to this violence and power seizure was the Quran whose beauty of language and elegance of form belied the terror it is capable of unleashing on unsuspecting generations of non-Muslims, and of Muslims who fail to measure up to the demands of their more puritanical co-religionists.

Muhammad's conduct demonstrates his understanding of the Quran's message.

If his understandings were correct, then all attempts by Islamic apologists to prove that Islam is a basically tolerant and peaceful religion fail when confronted by the Medina Sura and the indisputable facts of Muhammad's life and subsequent history of Islam.

If his understandings were wrong, then he was not a prophet, and Muslims have the problem of reconciling the alleged divine origin of the Quran with its myriad errors of fact, inconsistencies, anachronisms and many other defects.

To those who would claim the nature of Jihad and the militaristic aims of Islam are misunderstood by non-Muslims, we turn back a challenge that Muhammad repeatedly flung at his adversaries in Mecca: prove me wrong 'if you care about the truth'.

SYDNEY'S Bible belt is known for its McMansions, aspirational voters and enthusiastic church-goers. But the conservative, affluent Hills District is also in the grip of a crime wave - and mortgage stress may be behind it.

Over the past four years, Baulkham Hills Shire has experienced rising rates of violence and robbery. Domestic violence has risen by almost 20 per cent, assault is up by almost 10 per cent and harassment by 23 per cent.

There have been five murders in the past two years; there were none in the five years before that. They include the stabbing murder of Richard Carruthers, the 36-year-old redesigner of the Olympic cauldron, in his Castle Hill home. Three of the murders remain unsolved.

Earlier this year, a massive liquid ecstasy seizure was made at Castle Hill Industrial Estate, and in September two eight-year-old girls were sexually assaulted behind a basketball stadium in the Fred Caterson Reserve.

Figures from the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research also show a rise in the number of break and enters, malicious damage, breaching of bail conditions, stealing from motor vehicles and cannabis charges in the four years to June 30.

Despite the increase, the area has a low crime rate compared with other parts of Sydney ...

These journos go to great lengths to avoid using the word Muslim or Middle Eastern when speaking of crime, yet within the blink of an eye in a so-called Bible belt area, they'll freely associate Christians and crime.

From what I have heard of the Hills district it is still plenty white and Christian, but a person who used to live there a year ago told me in his daughter's class all but two kids spoke more than one language.

I know a police officer who used to work in Castle Hill in the 80s/90s and he said nothing ever happened there. It definitely wasn't diverse then, but it's well on the way now.

Mortgage stress? More likely your presumption of Christian perpetrators is wrong. But there's no story in that, is there?

NSW police are quitting at a faster rate than ever, new figures reveal.

By the end of the year about 800 experienced officers will have left the force in 2007. Despite the State Government's high-profile recruitment program, which has attracted 1300 rookies this year, departures are occurring at an average of 66 a month.

The state has 500 more police than before the March state election but 250 fewer than promised by Premier Morris Iemma.

If the trend continues critics say 4200 new officers would need to be found to fulfil a promise of 16,500 police on the street by 2011.

The exodus has prompted Opposition calls for compulsory exit interviews with resigning and retiring officers to ask why they are leaving ...

At least the opposition is on the ball. While you're at it, go make exit interviews with nurses. I'd bet neither police nor nurses can stomach the diversity and disrespect. And why would a police officer put their life on the line for a country and people that is rapidly being extinguished by diversity. All their efforts are in vain. Create a white sanctuary, however, and suddenly we have something cohesive and lasting that is worth investing your energy into.

Plus the stupidity of immigration from races that are bigger and stronger than us e.g. Kiwis and Islanders. And you expect little miss policewoman to deal with that.

A recent Saudi court ruling sentencing a woman to six months in jail and 200 lashes despite being gang-raped highlights the injustice faced by women in the ultra-conservative kingdom, women rights activists said.

"Sure, there is injustice against women in courts. It is a bitter situation that Saudi women have to endure," Saudi activist Wajiha al-Hweider said on Thursday, after the court ruling received widespread publicity.

"The kingdom is in an embarrassing position. King (Abdullah) should step in and stop this farce," Hweider told AFP, adding that the judicial system, which is based on Islamic law, should be reformed.

Despite being raped by seven men who kidnapped her with a male companion at knife-point, the 19-year-old woman was sentenced in November 2006 to 90 lashes.

The judge sentenced her for being in a car with a man who was not her relative, a taboo in the ultra-conservative desert kingdom.

But her story hit international headlines last week when her sentence was increased to six months in jail and 200 lashes after she spoke to the media.

Except for immediate family members, men and women cannot mix in Saudi Arabia, which applies a rigorous doctrine of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism. Women must also cover themselves from head to toe in public and are banned from driving or travelling without permission from their male guardian.

The men were initially sentenced to one to five years in jail, but those terms were also increased last week to between two and nine years ...

Women in the ultra-conservative Muslim powerhouse of Saudi Arabia navigate through life amid harsh restrictions imposed by a rigid interpretation of Islam and stringent tradition ...

They are mostly unwritten restrictions based on tradition and religion and as such have come to be considered law.

Home to Islam's holiest sites, Mecca and Medina, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia is ruled by Wahhabism, a rigorous doctrine of Sunni Islam whose sharia (laws) impose a total segretation of the sexes.

So in the view of the kingdom's conservative society, the young rape victim broke the first of a string of cardinal rules and sinned by being in the physical presence of a male who is not a directly-related relative.

In Saudi Arabia, a male guardian, who could be the woman's grandfather, father, uncle, husband, son or brother, literally controls her life.

And no matter how old they are, Saudi women need a "mahram" or a guardian -- a husband or close male relative if they are widowed or single -- in order to apply for and obtain a passport.

"Here, the son is the male guardian of his mother if she is a widow or divorced. She would need his written approval for anything... She has no value," said Saudi activist Wajiha al-Hweider

Fellow women rights activist Hatoon al-Fassi said women in Saudi Arabia suffer from the lack of written laws, which subjects rulings concerning them to the discretion of jugdes, and complained of "male-chauvinism" in her country.

"A woman is treated always as a minor and as a second-class citizen," said Fassi, a history at King Saud University in Riyadh ...

Photos: Saudi women in Riyadh and Hofuf. Protest near the consulate of Saudi Arabia in Mumbai. (source Yahoo)

1. Pauline's Party2. One Nation3. Christian Democratic4. Conservatives for Climate and Environment5. Liberal6. Family First7. Laborand not much thought for the rest of the 79 boxes (*).

For me, the biggest issue was immigration. CDP will not win my House of Reps seat, so my preference will go Liberal, but they made a stand against Muslim immigration so they got my vote.

For the Senate, Pauline and One Nation will oppose both Muslim and African immigration. I think the environment deserves some recognition, so I went with the Conservatives for Climate. If none of them get up, then my preference goes Liberal again.

Work Choices bothered me, I think the Libs pushed it too far, but Ross Gittins reckoned there was not much difference in the end - both parties compromised.

With immigration, the Liberals have let in record numbers of immigrants. Most notably, a lot of Africans, and I would have like to have kicked them for that. But I don't think Labor would be any better, judging by the state leaders who called Kevin Andrews a deep-South racist for limiting the Africans. And I still worry Labor is soft and wet.

A lot of right-wingers go on about the right to bare arms, and whilst I agree generally in the right to self defence, I haven't entertained thoughts of giving preferences to the shooters party.

In the end, CDP and Pauline are the most vocal on immigration.

Voting is hard.* I didn't literally vote 1 to 7 for those parties. I numbered incrementally through each of the groups' candidates i.e. Pauline (1-2), One Nation (3-7), CDP (8-15) or whatever the numbers were.

San Francisco will give resident identification cards to illegal immigrants under a plan approved on Tuesday amid a fierce nationwide debate on granting privileges to undocumented aliens.

In a 10-1 vote, the city's board of supervisors -- the equivalent of a city council -- approved giving identification cards to all residents, including illegal immigrants. The move makes San Francisco the largest U.S. city to back such a plan.

Residents will be able to obtain the resident cards by presenting photo identification and proof they live in the city, such as a utility bill. It was unclear if the new cards, which will be accepted at libraries and health clinics, will carry photos.

Such a move had been expected from San Francisco, which is famously liberal. Earlier this year, Mayor Gavin Newsom said he would not allow city officials and employees to assist immigration raids by federal authorities seeking people who had committed crimes or disregarded deportation orders.

San Francisco, which declared itself a "sanctuary city" in 1989, also this year launched a program to provide medical care to uninsured residents regardless of their immigration status.

At the state level, California's Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has vetoed bills that would allow undocumented aliens to obtain state identification cards, including driver's licenses.

By contrast, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, proposed giving illegal immigrants drivers licenses. But he was forced to drop the plan last week due to overwhelming opposition, even from presidential candidates from his own party like Hillary Clinton.

WASHINGTON - Millions of people who applied for naturalization and other immigration benefits to beat a midsummer fee increase are caught in a paperwork pileup that threatens the chance for some to become U.S. citizens in time to vote in next November's presidential election ...

The immigration agency would not say how many applications it has received. The American Immigration Lawyers Association, a private legal advocacy group, said it was told by agency officials that 3.5 million applications had come in over a two-month period. The agency projected a workload of 3.2 million applications for fiscal years 2008 and 2009.

Gonzalez ordered his staff to give priority to naturalizations, but some applicants will miss voting in primaries, which begin in January.

"I really want to target the elections," Gonzalez said. "I really want to get as many people out there to vote as possible." ...

Some groups that have been waging national campaign to help 1 million legal residents become citizens and vote in 2008 fear the pileup will hurt their efforts ...

The failure to anticipate the swamp of applications has left some skeptical of the agency and uncertain whether the pileup is political.

"I hope there is no politics involved, but it makes me wonder when it's a Republican administration and those pushing anti-immigrant legislation are Republicans and the ones managing this process are Republicans," Medina said.

FAMILY FIRST believes migrants and refugees have made a positive and enriching contribution to the Australia's development and will continue to have a positive impact on our society's growth and prosperity;

FAMILY FIRST recognises and supports Australia's international and humanitarian commitments in regard to asylum seekers while also advancing the need to protect Australia’s borders from illegal immigration;

FAMILY FIRST recognises that many asylum seekers wait for many years in refugee camps and believes in strengthening international and Australian agencies and institutions charged withthe responsibility of managing and processing the flow of displaced peoples so refugees may be resettled more quickly;

FAMILY FIRST also recognises the importance of ensuring well managed immigration programs that, while supporting Australia’s interests, are also compassionate and supportive of families.

FAMILY FIRST supports providing additional resources to ensure detention time is kept to an absolute minimum. Asylum seekers should then be transferred to low security facilities that are more like a home than a prison until their claims can be fully processed;

FAMILY FIRST believes the claims assessment process should be reformed to ensure fast and fair processing of asylum seekers to promptly determine the substance of their claims for refugee status;

FAMILY FIRST supports the position that applicants not eligible to remain in Australia should be deported as soon as is practicable.

But FAMILY FIRST believes deportation rules should be relaxed for those who have suffered long periods of detention and uncertainty.

One positive, but probably fruitless, policy:

FAMILY FIRST supports measures to encourage countries in our region to become signatories to the Refugee Convention, to discourage the secondary movement of asylum seekers, to curb the criminal and exploitative activity of people smuggling and to share the load more equitably among nations;

I conclude that Family First has no idea about immigration levels and therefore supports: more of the same, middle of the road, keep everybody happy except the majority. It is also non-discriminatory, so Muslims and Africans will keep coming. And it is very refugee friendly, so expect more of them. More open-borders madness. Not good. I'd vote CDP before FF, at least they oppose Muslims.

NATIONAL Australia Bank is considering proposals that threaten the jobs of about 400 information technology employees in a program causing angst throughout the bank's 2700-strong IT workforce ...

Internal documents show NAB hired the outsourcing specialist TPI earlier this year to ask IT providers to suggest options for three of its IT units. Infosys, Satyam, IBM and Accenture all submitted proposals, which are now being considered ...

Jobs that could be sent overseas include enterprise information management and software development using SAP, both in the enterprise services technology unit, and the testing of NAB's Australian banking operations. Those units employ about 410 people ...

MORE than 200 Indians who may have fraudulently secured residency through a scheme that allegedly defrauded the National Australia Bank may be deported.

The alleged scam was uncovered after the bank found discrepancies in loans issued by a now-suspended manager.

The Australian Federal Police has been called in to investigate as the bank tries to recoup $22.7 million it fears may be lost.

Documents lodged in the Federal Court allege ex-Moorabbin East business banking centre manager Akshay Batra admitted to the bank he provided 227 $100,000 loans to Indians so they could get a general skilled migration visa.

The Indians allegedly used the loans to buy government-issued bonds, which, until recent changes, earned them five points towards the 100 that were required to get the visa ...

Judge Mark Weinberg told NAB's counsel Robert Strong in court on Monday that the bank should have alerted the Australian Federal Police to the matter of $22.7 million being illegally withdrawn by an employee to enable 227 Indian nationals to obtain residency visas.

"The bank is not showing very much indication that it takes this seriously," Judge Weinberg told Mr Strong.

"We are talking about a major migration scam."

Akshay Batra, a business banking centre manager in suburban Melbourne who also was a registered migration agent, worked with a West Footscray-based mortgage broker Rajesh Narad to conduct the scam.

Mr Narad advised 227 Indian nationals he could help them complete their residency requirements for a general skilled migration visa by showing $100,000 worth of savings in government bonds, a provision scrapped in September.

Mr Batra issued fraudulent loans to purchase the bonds, which are now effectively owned by the bank, the Review said ...

There are different types of visa like business visa, travel visa, short term visa, permanent visa etc. Many times, people applying for visas are ignorant about the thin lines about different visas and some are even totally ignorant about the visa rules and regulations. Consequently, their applications for visa get rejected, leaving them dejected. TMZ Migration & Visa is the kind of organization for such people and also for others, who are aware of the rules but need assistance.

There is nothing inherent in Muslims that would make them bad citizens and the LDP does not believe in discriminating against people on the basis of religion. We support a high level of non-discriminatory immigration and equal rights for all Muslims in Australia …

The free movement of people, within and between countries, generally contributes to greater prosperity than when movement is restricted.

Like the free movement of goods and capital, the free movement of people is not only a basic human right but also contributes to economic growth by allowing the benefits of greater trade in the labour market. This trade benefits both the new immigrant and their new nation. Immigrant nations such as America, Australia, New Zealand and Canada have benefited enormously from high levels of immigration ...

Free Immigration Agreements

The idea of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) is becoming increasingly popular, with Australia already engaged in agreements with New Zealand, Singapore, Thailand and America. These agreements allow for the relatively free flow of good and services between the two countries in recognition that such an agreement is in their mutual interests.

The same rationale applies for immigration. Indeed, the argument for Free Immigration Agreements (FIAs) is probably stronger than the argument for FTAs as the option of truly multi-lateral free movement of people is not viable and so the most efficient outcome is not available.FIAs should be negotiated with countries that share our basic values (rule of law, democracy) and only in situations where there is no expectation of a surge of immigration. Migrants between FIA countries would have the rights of a permanent resident and would retain the citizenship of their home country.

Australia currently has an "open door" policy with New Zealand and people move relatively freely between Australia and New Zealand to the benefit of both countries. Good candidate countries for an FIA include Canada, Singapore, Hong Kong, the UK, Ireland and the Netherlands among others ...

Unauthorized arrivals and refugees

It is important that Australia provide a sanctuary for people who are fleeing political oppression and persecution, both on compassionate grounds and to demonstrate to the rest of the world the attractions of a free and democratic society. Such people can also become fierce advocates of freedom in Australia, having experienced its loss.

The Prime Minister, Mr Howard, has declared that he finds the full head-to-toe Islamic dress "confronting". He said that most Australians would agree with him. On this issue, the Secular Party does agree with him, but for no doubt different reasons. Mr Howard would find that the burqa confronts his Christian values. We find that our secular values are confronted ...

The burqa is confronting, for secular reasons, as follows. Religious freedom does not entitle one to impose one's beliefs on others. To an unreasonable extent, the burqa does this. Facial recognition and interpretation of facial expressions is a natural part of human interaction. Our brains have evolved substantial capacities in this regard. That a religious belief should impose a requirement for a one-way barrier to such interactions is certainly unnatural, but presumably acceptable if done with the consent, and in the company, of mutual believers.

When this restriction is imposed on non-believers, without their consent, and where normal human interaction is still expected, a boundary has been crossed. The fact that such an expectation may arise due to a presumption of superior religious perceptions is not relevant. The imposition is unjustified, and therefore unjust. Given that such behaviour may contribute to social disharmony, it may also be considered harmful. Violation of the principles of non-harm and justice, puts the burqa in violation of secular norms of morality.

That is why the burqa is confronting. It confronts secular values. The Secular Party urges that in public places, where normal social interaction is expected, that burqas not be worn.

And I'd go further and say that the hijab and other religious garb are advertised and imposed religion. And even further and say that Africans amongst us are an unnatural human interaction. And it's all confronting to the subconscious - without the need to justify it at a higher level. But in the end I don't think the Secular Party opposes immigration of Muslims or Africans, so they don't get my vote.

Oh, and I just read they are 'pro gay families'. Sorry, have to judge that one as another unnatural human interaction. Equally nauseating at the subconscious level. Definitely not getting my vote.

Justice Louis Brandeis outlined the pattern in 1919. Americanization, he said, means that the immigrant “adopts the clothes, the manners, and the customs generally prevailing here … substitutes for his mother tongue the English language” and comes “into complete harmony with our ideals and aspirations and cooperate[s] with us for their attainment.” Until the 1960s, the Brandeis model mostly prevailed. Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish groups, understanding that assimilation was the best ticket to stability and social and economic success, eagerly aided in the task of integrating their charges into American society.

The story is very different today. In America, there is a dangerous new tide of immigration from Asia, a variety of Muslim countries, and Latin America, especially from Mexico. The tide is new not only chronologically but also in substance. First, there is the sheer matter of numbers. More than 2,200,000 legal immigrants came to the U.S. from Mexico in the 1990s alone. The number of illegal Mexican immigrants is staggering. So is their birth rate. Altogether there are more than 8 million Mexicans in the U.S. Some parts of the Southwest are well on their way to becoming what Victor Davis Hanson calls “Mexifornia,” “the strange society that is emerging as the result of a demographic and cultural revolution like no other in our times.” A professor of Chicano Studies at the University of New Mexico gleefully predicts that by 2080 parts of the Southwest United States and Northern Mexico will join to form a new country, “La Republica del Norte.”

The problem is not only one of numbers, though. Earlier immigrants made—and were helped and goaded by the ambient culture to make—concerted efforts to assimilate. Important pockets of these new immigrants are not assimilating, not learning English, not becoming or thinking of themselves primarily as Americans. The effect of these developments on American identity is disastrous and potentially irreversible.

Such developments are abetted by the left-wing political and educational elites of this country, whose dominant theme is the perfidy of traditional American values. Hence the passion for multiculturalism and the ideal of ethnic hyphenation that goes with it. This has done immense damage in schools and colleges as well as in the population at large. By removing the obligation to master English, multiculturalism condemns whole sub-populations to the status of permanent second-class citizens. By removing the obligation to adopt American values, it fosters what the German novelist Hermann Broch once called a “value vacuum,” a sense of existential emptiness that breeds anomie and the pathologies of nihilism.

As if in revenge for this injustice, however, multiculturalism also weakens the social bonds of the community at large. The price of imperfect assimilation is imperfect loyalty. Take the movement for bilingualism. Whatever it intended in theory, in practice it means not mastering English. It has notoriously left its supposed beneficiaries essentially monolingual, often semi-lingual. The only “bi” involved is a passion for bifurcation, which is fed by the accumulated resentments instilled by the anti-American multicultural orthodoxy. Every time you call directory assistance or some large corporation and are told “Press One for English” and “Para español oprime el numero dos” it is another small setback for American identity ...

The combined effect of the multicultural enterprise has been to undermine the foundation of American national identity. Huntington speaks dramatically but not inaptly of “Deconstructing America.” What he has in mind are not the linguistic tergiversations of a Jacques Derrida or Michel Foucault but the efforts—politically if not always intellectually allied efforts—to disestablish the dominant culture by fostering a variety of subversive attitudes, pieces of legislation, and judicial interventions. “The deconstructionists,” Huntington writes,

promoted programs to enhance that status and influence of subnational racial, ethnic, and cultural groups. They encouraged immigrants to maintain their birth-country cultures, granted them legal privileges denied to native-born Americans, and denounced the idea of Americanization as un-American. They pushed the rewriting of history syllabi and textbooks so as to refer to the “peoples” of the United States in place of the single people of the Constitution. They urged supplementing or substituting for national history the history of subnational groups. They downgraded the centrality of English in American life and pushed bilingual education and linguistic diversity. They advocated legal recognition of group rights and racial preferences over the individual rights central to the American Creed. They justified their actions by theories of multiculturalism and the idea that diversity rather than unity or community should be America’s overriding value. The combined effect of these efforts was to promote the deconstruction of the American identity that had been gradually created over three centuries.

Taken together, Huntington concludes, “these efforts by a nation’s leaders to deconstruct the nation they governed were, quite possibly, without precedent in human history.”

The various movements to deconstruct American identity and replace it with a multicultural “rainbow” or supra-national bureaucracy have made astonishing inroads in the last few decades and especially in the last several years. And, as Huntington reminds us, the attack on American identity has counterparts elsewhere in the West wherever the doctrine of multiculturalism has trumped the cause of national identity. The European Union—whose unelected leaders are as dedicated to multicultural shibboleths as they are to rule by top-down, anti-democratic bureaucracy—is a case in point. But the United States, the most powerful national state, is also the most attractive target for deconstruction.

It is a curious development that Huntington traces. In many respects, it corroborates James Burnham’s observation, in Suicide of the West (1964), that “liberalism permits Western civilization to be reconciled to dissolution.” For what we have witnessed with the triumph of multiculturalism is a kind of hypertrophy or perversion of liberalism, as its core doctrines are pursued to the point of caricature.

Assimilation only happens under the weight of a dominant population, and the weight of a confident culture. Neither of these conditions exist in the West now. Assimilation is a thing of the past. That's why immigration of incompatibles should stop.

The nature of the July London bombings reveals that Australia faces a steep learning curve to meet the terrorist threat, warns John Miller, a former senior intelligence officer ...

John Stone, a former Australian senior public servant and later a senator, has recently challenged some long-held shibboleths in The Australian (July 23, 2005). His conclusion? At present, Muslim immigration should virtually cease. Rod Liddle, writing in the UK Spectator magazine (July 16, 2005), has said pithily:

"Truth is, Islam is not remotely a peaceable religion, compared with, say, paganism, Zoroastrianism, or Buddhism and Sikhism or Judaism or modern Christianity for that matter, and still less humanism. Nor is it particularly well integrated, compared with say, Hinduism or Sikhism or Judaism ..."

Dewy-eyed proponents of multiculturalism will have to face the fact that more draconian security measures will need to be instituted.

We will have to seriously consider cessation of migration from certain countries and heightened screening of visitors and tourists ...

In Pogo's immortal phrase, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

The last thing that Australia needs is precipitate action. Nevertheless, there is a good case for the Prime Minister to recall Federal Parliament:

* to suspend further Muslim immigration; ...

We need swift action, not procrastination and endless discussion ...

It is not a question of if, but when, one of our major cities is attacked.

Distasteful and unpalatable though it may seem, in circumstances of doubt in dealing with multicultural matters, the Government must be seen to have all necessary power to deal with terrorism in all its aspects, from the school, the reading-room, the madrassa, through to the mosque.

The doublespeak employed by certain Islamic clerics should be identified for what it is - coded instructions for jihad or support thereof ...

As for the media, we need no more bleeding-heart stories about ASIO arrests and harassment or raids. Those legally-sanctioned raids have been based on information received and, as with the police force, are not conducted on the basis of a knee-jerk reaction.

The media has a great capacity to undermine public confidence in the forces of law and order and national security. Such action in itself should be prohibited and the D notice system should be updated and applied to all forms of the media, including the Internet ...

Australia has often been called the lucky country but there is a time, as everyone knows, when luck runs out. It might not be tomorrow, but who knows when?

Glazov: Many Muslims I talk to often tell me that their Prophet was a man of "peace." As you demonstrate once again in your new book, he so clearly was not. Tell us briefly how he wasn't. And do the Muslims that I speak with not read the Koran? Or do they have a different concept of "peace"?

Trifkovic: Those Muslims you talk to seem to have adopted the dialectical forma mentis of Stalin's apologists who'd have told you that his winter war against Finland was "defensive" and the Gulag was justified, or exaggerated, or both. Yes, the problem is that Muhammad remains, to all true Muslims, the inviolable paragon of goodness, and imitatio Muhammadi is reflected in the prevalence of his name throughout the Muslim world. Understanding him is the key to the Muslim world outlook.

The truth is grim, and for that reason the entire debate about those Danish cartoons last winter was flawed. The real problem is this: a figure as disturbing as the founder of Islam should not be gently made fun of - the cartoons were quite innocuous - at least not until his remarkable career has been given a vigorous public treatment in the Western world. The trouble with those cartoons was not that they offended fervent Muslims - that sort are offended by our very existence - but that by their placid humor they humanized a man with a hugely problematic legacy, and thereby offended the memory of untold millions of victims of Jihad through the ages.

Ahmed Akkari, spokesman of the Muslim organizations in Denmark, said that Muslims all over the world want the "truth" about their prophet known to the rest of the world. OK, fine: let us look at Muhammad as "he really was in history," relying solely on orthodox Islamic sources, the Kuran and the hadith. Those sources provide an account of uncertain historical accuracy, but that account is regarded as true by all true Muslims and it provides the scriptural basis for the Muslim faith and the Islamic law. It tells us that he violated the sacred pagan month of Rajab, when no Arab was permitted to raise arms in battle by staging pirate raids on caravans from Mecca. In 624, at Badr, he killed forty Meccans in battle and executed prisoners, with Allah's approval: "instill terror into the hearts of the unbelievers, Smite ye above their necks and smite all their finger tips of them." (8:12) After Badr, to quote Ayatollah Khomeini, "Islam grew with blood."

Muhammad used the prospect of booty and ransom to recruit followers. This motive was so important that it merited a whole sura in the Kuran; but one fifth of everything was Muhammad's! Once the loot was divided it was time to relax: "Now enjoy what ye have won. as lawful and good." As for the fallen, a tangible, X-rated paradise filled with virgins "untouched by man" and "fresh" pre-pubescent boys awaited the "martyrs" immediately. The simple preacher eventually morphed into a vengeful warlord, who jubilantly exclaimed that the spectacle of severed enemy heads pleased him better than "the choicest camel in Arabia." Killing prisoners was divinely condoned by Allah. (8:68) Fresh revelations described the unbelievers as "the worst animals" (8:55) and "the vilest of creatures" (98:6) undeserving of mercy. The enemies' heads were to be cut off. (47:4) Killing, enslaving and robbing them was divinely sanctioned and mandated.

When Muhammad returned from Badr to Medina in triumph, he proceeded to settle scores with his detractors - and resorted to murder. He killed Abu Afak, an elderly Jew who dared question Muhammad's methods, and Asma bint Marwan, a poetess who had mocked him in verse, followed by another poet, Kab Ashraf. They were guilty of verbal insults, providing the Islamic view of the freedom of speech that is valid to this day.

Muhammad next told his followers to "kill any Jew you can lay your hands on." When six of his henchmen murdered an elderly Jew by the name of Abu Rafi in his sleep, they argued whose weapon had actually ended the victim's life. The prophet decided that the owner of the sword that still had traces of food on it was entitled to the credit: Abu Rafi had just eaten his dinner before falling asleep, and the fatal slash went through his stomach. The "Prophet's" attack against the Jewish tribe of Banu-'l-Mustaliq came next. His followers kidnapped 500 of their women, and the night after the battle they staged an orgy of rape. His pogroms culminated in the attack the last Jewish tribe in Medina, Banu Qurayzah. Up to 900 men were decapitated in a ditch, in front of their women and children. Allah praised Muhammad for the way "he struck terror into their hearts." (33:25) The women were subsequently raped. Muhammad chose as his concubine one Raihana Bint Amr, whose father and husband were both slaughtered before her eyes only hours earlier.

Allah's messages concerning "the infidel" subsequently grew ever harsher: "Take him and fetter him and expose him to hell fire." (69:30-37) They "will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off." (5:33-34) In this world, for the captured infidel "We have prepared chains, yokes and a blazing fire." (76:4) In the hereafter things get even worse: "garments of fire will be cut out for them, boiling fluid will be poured down their heads. Whereby that which is in their bellies, and their skins too, will be melted. And for them are hooked rods of iron." (22:19-22) One single Kuranic verse, "the Verse of the Sword," (9:5) Islamic scholars agree, abrogates 124 earlier verses - the ones that are quoted most regularly by Islam's apologists to prove its tolerance and benevolence.

Muhammad's progression from a marginalized outsider to a master of life and death produced a transformation of his personality in the decade preceding his death in 633 AD. Allah was invoked as the authority supporting the prophet's daily political objectives and his personal needs. Nowhere was this more obvious than when it came to his exaggerated sensuality. He came up with a Kuranic verse approving his nightly trysts with an Egyptian slave girl and admonishing his jealous wives for their objections to the practice. (66:1-3) Allah's revelation also enabled Muhammad to take his daughter-in-law Zainab as a wife when he lusted after her. (36:37)

Glazov: You discuss how Muhammad married Aisha when she was seven and still playing with dolls and that he had sex with her when she was nine. Can you kindly explain to me what Muslims think about this in their thinking of their Prophet? Every time I try to raise this issue with devout Muslims there is a lot of double-talk and a lot of anger directed at me. I never get anywhere on this issue. Can you give us your wisdom on this?

Trifkovic: There is no "wisdom," there is common decency and natural morality. Yes, Muslims need to be pressed on the rape of Aisha, and on the murders, ethnic cleansing, and genocide. On the whole, many commands of the Kuran and Muhammad's actions and words recorded in the Traditions are morally abhorrent and criminal not only by the standards of our time, but even in the context of 7th century Arabia! They were often considered repugnant by Muhammad's contemporaries. He had to resort to "revelations" as a means of justifying his actions and suppressing the prevalent moral code of his own society. Attacking caravans in the holy month, taking up arms against one's kinsmen, slaughtering prisoners, reserving a lion's share of the booty, murdering people without provocation, violating treaties, and indulging one's sensual passions, was also at odds with the moral standards of his Arab contemporaries. Only the ultimate authority could sanction it, and Allah duly obliged him.

On the whole, Muhammad's practice and constant encouragement of bloodshed are unique in the history of religions.Allah's order to "kill the unbelievers wherever you find them" is an injunction both unambiguous and powerful.The word "genocide" was not even coined when Muhammad conveyed Allah's alleged dictum, "When we decide to destroy a population. then we destroy them utterly." (17:16-17) Disobedient people "we utterly destroyed." (21:11) That Islam sees the world as an open-ended conflict between the Land of Peace (Dar al-Islam) and the Land of War (Dar al-Harb), which must be conquered by jihad, is the most important bequest of Muhammad to history.The end of Jihad is possible only when "there prevail justice and faith in Allah" everywhere. (2:193) Muhammad thus postulated the fundamental illegitimacy of the existence of a non-Muslim world. Muslims could contemplate tactical ceasefires, but never jihad's complete abandonment short of the unbelievers' abject submission.

On its own admission Islam stands or falls with the person of Muhammad, a deeply flawed man by the standards of his own society, as well as those of the Old and New Testaments, both of which he acknowledged as divine revelation; and even by the new law, of which he claimed to be the divinely appointed medium and custodian. The problem of Islam, and the problem of the rest of the world with Islam, is not the remarkable career of Muhammad per se, undoubtedly a "great man" in terms of his impact on human history. It is the religion's claim that the words and acts of its prophet provide the universally valid standard of morality as such, for all time and all men. Our judgment on Muhammad rests on evidence of his followers and faithful admirers. Even on such evidence, the verdict of the civilized world goes against the "prophet." That verdict, once it is passed - and it will be passed - will make the gentle mockery of Muhammad in those cartoons appear as inappropriate as it would be inappropriate today to lampoon Hitler for his out-of-wedlock liaison with Ewa Braun, or for his inability to control flatulence.

When a Muslim family moved in down the street, Katie Jackman, a Christian woman, decided to reach out to them. When she knocked on their door and introduced herself, the family seemed delighted. They invited her in for tea and later invited her whole family to come for dinner, which they did.

But no matter how many times Katie invited her Muslim neighbors to have dinner at her house, and no matter how often they promised to do so, they never actually came.

Although Katie did not know it, there was a religious reason behind this family’s refusal to enter her house.

Patrick Sookhdeo, a Muslim convert to Christianity who is also an Anglican priest, is the author of Islam: The Challenge to the Church. Dr. Sookhdeo writes that many Christians are confused by the seemingly capricious way in which their Muslim neighbors relate to them. This is because they are unaware of the many Koranic teachings that regulate relations with those outside the faith.

For example, hospitality and the exchange of gifts is the linchpin of relationships among Muslims, and many Muslims also invite Christians into their homes and give them gifts. But this seldom works in reverse. This is more than simply a concern about eating non-halal food, Sookhdeo writes. “There is also the cultural concept of Christians as being religiously ‘unclean,’ arising from the discriminatory laws against them in sharia. There’s also the fact that accepting a meal means owing a favor to the host.”

Another problem may be your family pet. Religiously observant Muslims may refuse to enter a home that contains a dog, since dogs are considered unclean.

As for gifts—many Muslims will be eager to give a copy of the Koran to Christian neighbors, but they will refuse to accept a copy of the Bible in return. “Muslims are always on the alert for opportunities for mission,” Sookdeo says, “but they guard themselves against anything that might serve to deflect them from the way of Islam, such as the scriptures of another faith.”

In their efforts to reach out to Muslims, Christians must beware of taking part in one-sided events that benefit Islam at the expense of Christianity. For instance, a Christian pastor may invite a local imam to speak from the pulpit as part of a cultural exchange. But all too often, Sookhdeo says, “the pattern is that the imam preaches in the church and the minister merely prays in the mosque.” Muslims view this as a victory. As with the attempted exchange of scriptures, Sookhdeo writes, “Muslims will use every opportunity to promote their faith and to prevent the similar promotion of Christianity.” Christians end up doing all the learning while Muslims do all the teaching.

When Jesus sent His disciples out into the world, He warned them, in Matthew 10, to be as wise as serpents and innocent as doves. This is clearly the approach we need to take as we interact with the Muslims among us ...